TORONTO 5, MINNESOTA 2 IN MINNESOTA
Date: Wednesday, June 26.
Batting stars: Chili Davis was 2-for-4 with a two-run homer (his eighteenth) and a double. Chuck Knoblauch was 2-for-4.
Pitching stars: Carl Willis pitched four innings of relief, giving up one run on four hits and no walks and striking out four. Terry Leach pitched 1.1 scoreless innings, giving up one hit.
Opposition stars: David Wells pitched eight innings, giving up two runs on seven hits and a walk and striking out two. Joe Carter was 4-for-5 with two doubles and two RBIs. Glenallen Hill was 3-for-4 with a double. Devon White was 3-for-5 with a triple, a double, a stolen base (his eighteenth) and two runs. Roberto Alomar was 2-for-4 with a triple, a walk, and two RBIs.
The game: This time it was the Blue Jays who jumped out to an early lead. White started the game with a double and stole third. Alomar then tripled and Carter doubled, putting Toronto up 2-0 after the first three batters of the game. Twins starter Mark Guthrie then settled down, and there was no more scoring until the fourth. With two out Hill singled, White tripled, and Carter singled to make the score 4-0.
The Twins got a man to second base in the first, fourth, and fifth, but could not score. The Blue Jays added one more run in the sixth. Manny Lee singled, stole second, went to third on a wild pitch, and scored on an Alomar single, increasing the lead to 5-0.
The Twins again got a man to second in the seventh and did not score. They finally got on the board in the eighth when Knoblauch singled and Davis hit a two-out two-run homer. After that, however, all the Twins could do is a single by Shane Mack in the ninth. The score remained 5-2.
WP: Wells (9-4). LP: Guthrie (5-4). S: Tom Henke (13).
Notes: Gene Larkin was again at first base in place of Kent Hrbek. Al Newman pinch-hit for Scott Leius in the ninth. Randy Bush pinch-hit for Greg Gagne in the ninth. The pinch-hitters the Twins used had batting averages of .202 and .210, respectively.
Brian Harper was 0-for-4 and was batting .333. Kirby Puckett was 0-for-3 with a walk and was batting .324. Willis lowered his ERA to 3.03. Leach's ERA went down to 3.26.
Guthrie allowed four runs in 3.2 innings on eight hits and two walks, striking out one. His ERA was 5.66.
This was Guthrie's last start of the season. He would be replaced in the rotation initially by Paul Abbott. He would do much better out of the bullpen, going 2-1, 2.51, 1.37 WHIP with two saves in 43 innings (29 games). He would make only two more starts in his major league career, both in 1994. In his career as a starter, he was 13-18, 4.95, 1.52 WHIP. As a reliever, he was 38-36, 3.75, 1.36 WHIP with 14 saves.
This was the second-longest stint of Willis' season to date, topped only by his 4.2 innings on April 23. In August he would twice pitch five innings. He would have a very good season, going 8-3, 2.63, 1.07 WHIP. He would be about as good in 1992, going 7-3, 2.72, 1.06 WHIP. He started to slip a little in 1993, although he was still pretty good. After that he didn't get much accomplished, but from 1991-1993, he was a very effective relief pitcher.
This game is as good a place as any to declare the Twins' hot streak over. It was a pretty good one, though. From May 28 through June 25, the Twins won twenty-four out of twenty-seven. They went from sixth place to first place. They would not do that again, obviously, but they would continue to have winning months the rest of the season.
Record: The Twins were 44-28, in first place in the American League West, 3.5 games ahead of California.